Festivals of Light

I would like to thank (albeit belatedly) all who attended the event we recently held at a beautiful garden location in Glasgow. This was a very significant event for the Scottish students, and helped raise spiritual awareness in the country. The event was largely sponsored by the developers of the Gardens, as part of their Festivals of Light programme. The setting was a sanctuary garden using themes from Moorish, Persian, Italian and English formal gardens.

The music programme was well-received, with Udasina and Suswara leading the audience through a delightful festival of bhajans (devotional songs). Udasina's and Suswara's groups, along with Sahana and the Scottish boys, helped create a beautiful programme. Afterwards I received very favourable comments from the Director of the Gardens. He said he felt that Sri Chinmoy's students created a uniquely peaceful atmosphere. He also couldn't believe the high standard of the singing.

Inevitably, the Scottish weather played its part. We had planned for rain, so the Gardens' staff had bought tents to protect the performers. What we got though was cold - almost sub-zero temperatures. This did keep audience numbers down (about 300 members of the public came into the Gardens to listen and watch at various points), but none of them stayed long because of the cold.

At the mid point of the performances, Irene from Helensburgh planted the Sri Chinmoy Rose and a massive bonfire was lit. This improved audience figures for a while.

At dusk I went to a part of the Gardens which has a circular stream. So I sat in the middle of the circle (not in the middle of the water) and sang until dawn (about 4.5 hours). Some members of the public braved the cold for about three hours, but only Sri Chinmoy's students managed the whole thing. As lots of people went up to Loch Lomond during the evening, there were only about 5 students left at the end. My thanks to them though; they meant I always had an audience to sing to. I was frozen to the marrow by the time I finished, but I am happy to say that the voice held put (more or less) and a hot shower was as much as I needed to recover.

Sanjaya captured the evening on video, so there may be an opportunity to see the event at some point.

The most important thing is that the rose bush has blossomed and it budded three perfect roses. Click here to view a picture of the Sri Chinmoy Rose.

Click here to see more photos of the function and climbing Ben Lommand the next day.